The Indian Ocean

Oceanic Connections and the Creation of New Societies

Edited by Abdul Sheriff and Engseng Ho

· The maritime world as a conveyor of goods, ideas and peoples unites the contributors to this history of the Indian Ocean

· Indian Ocean significant as the first venue of global trade, connecting the Mediterranean and South China

· An anthropological and historical examination of the impact of maritime trade on wider society

The Indian Ocean

Oceanic Connections and the Creation of New Societies

Edited by Abdul Sheriff and Engseng Ho

A Hurst Publication

Description

The Indian Ocean was the first venue of global trade, connecting the Mediterranean and South China Sea. Inspired by the insights of Fernand Braudel, and by Michael Mollat, who saw it as 'a zone of encounters and contacts ... a privileged crossroads of culture,' this volume explores two inter-related themes. The first, on oceanic linkages, presents the diversity of the peoples who have traversed it and their relationships by tracing their tangible movements and connections. The second, on the creation of new societies, revisits better-known socio-historical phenomena--such as slavery, indentured labor, the Swahili language and Muslim charity--which tie the genesis of these social formations to the seascape of an interconnected, transcultural ocean. The chapters offer
a broad and diverse view of the mobile, transregional communities that comprise Indian Ocean society, while in-depth case studies allow students and specialists to see how individual research projects may contribute to developing a view of the Indian Ocean as a transcultural arena, one in which individual societies were and are shaped by their interactions with others from across the waters. This volume will be suitable for courses in the burgeoning fields of world history, transcultural anthropology and the Indian Ocean.

The Indian Ocean

Oceanic Connections and the Creation of New Societies

Edited by Abdul Sheriff and Engseng Ho

A Hurst Publication

Table of Contents

PrefaceTable of ContentsAbout authorsList of illustrationsChaptersIntroduction1. 1. Oceanic Movements and Connections2. 2. Migrations and Formation of new Societies1. 1. Globalisation With a Difference-an Overview, by Abdul Sheriff1. 1. The Indian Ocean as a 'Mediterranean'2. 2. The Maritime Milieu3. 3. The Logic and Role of Commerce4. 4. 'An Islamic Lake'5. 5. Cultural Fusions and Continuum 6. 6. The Global World of the Indian Ocean and its Antithesis

I. I. OCEANIC MOVEMENTS AND CONNECTIONS

1. 2. Maritime Trade, Political Relations and Residential Diplomacy in the World of the Indian Ocean, by Ravi Arvind Palat1. 1. Patterns of State-making Along the Indian Ocean Coasts of
Asia2. 2. Europeans in the Interstate System of the Indian Ocean

1. 3. Mapping the Indian Ocean World of Gulf Merchants, c. 1870-1960, by Dr. Fahad Ahmad Bishara1. 1. The Gulf and the Indian Ocean in Scholarship2. 2. Mapping Gulf Merchant Networks in the Indian Ocean, 1870-19303. 3. Credit, Trade and Authority Between the Gulf and Indian Ocea

1. 4. Between Pori, Pwani and Kisiwani: Overlapping Labour Cultures in the Caravans, Ports and Dhows of the Western Indian Ocean, by Stephen J. Rockel 1. 1. Porters and Sailors2. 2. Nineteenth-Century Caravan and Port Towns3. 3. Caravan and Maritime Crew Cultures

1. 5. The Question of Slavery in Indian Ocean World History, by Gwyn Campbell1. 1. The Slave Trade in the Indian
Ocean2. 2. Slave Functions3. 3. Characteristics of Indian Ocean Slavery4. 4. Slavery as a Form of Social Security5. 5. Assimilation6. 6. Slave Diaspora7. 7. Abolition in the IOW

1. 6. Indentured Labour in the Indian Ocean, and the Creation of New Societies, by Vijayalakshmi Teelock1. 1. Overview of Indentured Immigration2. Literature Survey3. General Critique of the Literature

2. MIGRATIONS AND FORMATION OF NEW SOCIETIES

7. The state of Swahili Civilisation: Swahili Language and Society, Indian Ocean Antecedents and Anthropological Research, by Mohamed Bakari 1. Beginnings 2. The (Ab)Uses of Miscegenation 3. Literature as a Mirror of Language 4. Dialectology as Basis for Reconstructing Linguistic
Continua 5. One Size Fits All 6. Interdisplinarity as the Future

9. Identity and Citizenship among the Comorians of Zanzibar, 1886-1963, by Iain Walker 1. Comorians and Zanzibar: the Establishment of a Community 2. Consolidating French Status 3. The Homeland and the Counties 4. The Yaminis and the Shimalis 5. The Comorian School 6. Zanzibar Immigration 7. Naturalisation as Zanzibaris

10. Philanthropy and Trust in the Straits of Melaka: Diversities in Civil and Global Approaches to Nationhoods, by Wazir Jahan Karim 1. Definitions and Concepts of Welfare, Philanthropy and Trust 2.
Entrepreneurs of History 3. Matrimonial Alliances and Philanthropy 4. The Pilgrimage as a New Source of Wealth and Privilege 5. The Business of Status Production6. The Rise of the Independent Muslim Press7. Volunteerism and Social Benefits8. Indigenous Communal Networks of Welfare and Philanthropy

The Indian Ocean

Oceanic Connections and the Creation of New Societies

Edited by Abdul Sheriff and Engseng Ho

A Hurst Publication

Author Information

Abdul Sheriff is Director of the Zanzibar Indian Ocean Research Institute and the author of Dhow Cultures of the Indian Ocean Cosmopolitanism, Commerce, and Islam, published by Hurst. Engseng Ho is Professor of Cultural Anthropology at Duke University and author of The Graves of Tarim: Genealogy and Mobility across the Indian Ocean, which tells of how Muslim sailors, scholars, merchants and settlers from Yemen have made a place for themselves across the Indian Ocean over the last 500 years.